Thursday, November 01, 2007

It has been a while since the Teacuppa online puerh tasting, and I remember hearing back then that their focus was more on Wuyi yancha and not on puerh. I have tasted about a half dozen of their Wuyi offerings now, and I can confidently say that they know their stuff when it comes to yancha. I suppose it's a bit ironic that I would happen to feel like blogging at the same time I brewed up my least favorite sample from them, but that's the way the cookie crumbles, I suppose.

The dry leaf is lovely in both appearance and fragrance: the leaves are dark, and there is a classic deep chocolate aroma, with the slightest hint of tropical fruit and spice. I decided to brew this fairly conservatively, with 6 grams of leaf in my 90mL yixing and long steep times (20 seconds to 2 minutes).

The first infusion, after a flash rinse, was pretty good. It was hearty, with a good amount of "fire," hints of tropical fruit, and a base of cocoa/coffee. There was even a healthy fruit aftertaste. After that, though, things went downhill quickly. It was thin, weak, and a bit sour. I'm thinking this tea probably needs more leaf to express itself best, but unfortunately I only got a 15g sample so there's not a lot I can do.

The wet leaf is mostly chopped up, with a few long leaves here and there.

Overall, I'd say this is just a mediocre tea. Not bad, but not great either. As I mentioned before, it is a shame that I felt like blogging as I tasted this. I'll get around to posting about the other Teacuppa yancha samples someday, but until then, I should say that this is the first one I wasn't thrilled with— all the others have been very good, and I recommend them wholeheartedly.